Mainstream Schooling a Child With Autism
Many parents of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) affected children choose to put their child in a mainstream school, either from the very beginning of their schooling or sometimes a bit later on.
Certainly mainstream schools are geared for a mainly academic curriculum, and even the special units which most Autistic, Aspergers (ASD) children would be attending are in most cases more academically inclined towards the education of the child, however it is arguable whether the child may benefit from such an environment. Certainly every individual is different in their abilities to learn and cope in such situations.
Problems Associated With Mainstream Schooling
One of the main problems associated with ASD children in mainstream schooling is without a doubt acceptance from other students. Unfortunately it is the ugly truth, kids can be very cruel and this can impact severely on the development of an already sensitive individual with learning difficulties.
In a perfect world a special unit in a mainstream school would have a very high student to teacher ratio, be physically and mentally safe (safe in respect to barriers to avoid wandering and safe from bullying and harassing) and have a flexible curriculum to cater for the widely varying abilities of the ASD students in certain age groups. There may be such a place or places, but in reality it would be very difficult and expensive to achieve. Add to this that as much as we would like, kids will be kids and the bullying and harassing, like it or not, would be one of the more difficult hurdles to jump, no parent that I know would want their child, Autistic or not, to go through the trauma of being a target.
Advantages of Mainstream Schooling
The pro’s of mainstream schooling is that the curriculum would be more academically focused for a child of that age and they would mix socially in class, in the yard and possibly out of school giving the ASD child more exposure to what is deemed to be “normal social behaviour” and thus giving them a better start to an independent future. This aspect is certainly in contrast to special schools which cater for individuals with a wide variety of disabilities and for some higher functioning Autistic, or ASD children may not be the best social learning environment.
Decision Making for Schooling a Child With Autism
When making a decision on which path to take for the schooling of an Autistic, Aspergers (ASD) child a parent or carer certainly has to be brutally honest with assessing whether their child would benefit and or even cope with which ever path they take. Certainly seek advise and opinions from a professional that knows your child such as a Doctor, Therapist, Psychologist, Family Advocate, or Disabilities consultant.
I certainly know from experience that this subject hits a raw nerve with most parents of children in the spectrum, however it is a truth we must face head on if we are to do the best for our child. This is just some points about choosing schooling for a child with Autism, Aspergers (ASD) or special needs, and is sourced only from our experience and opinions.
Let us know your experiences / thoughts on this subject and leave a reply!
© 2010 – 2011, Isy B. All rights reserved.
Related posts:
As a parent of two ASD children, I am amused to read this article implying we have a choice in the type of schooling on offer for our children! I suppose we have the choice to main school, private school or home school them, but in my experience I don’t consider any of the options available to us as a good fit.
My two children aged 11 and 12 years have had a turbulent time finding a school that is able to tolerate and respect their individual needs. I hesitated at home schooling as I had reservations in regards to their learning social skills and learning to dealing with personalities within our community. As my children are growing up, my opinion on this matter has changed and I no longer feel that removing them from the ultimate social environment (school) would mean they would lose valuable lessons on how to deal with the variety of personalities both negative and positive. On the contrary, if I had home schooled them in the primary years, I would have removed them from the negative and stressful elements of schooling, giving them a greater opportunity to gain a solid positive knowledge of who they are and the confidence and self esteem that would lead them to seek and study what they want in life regardless and oblivious to others opinions and judgments. There is plenty of time in life to face the realities of others immaturity, ignorance and arrogance that is bullying. It is so much easier to deal with the trauma of bullying if one feels self assured within themselves… in addition as we get older we have the choice of who we deal with and who we can remove from our environment, whilst main style schooling these choices are not an option.
It is common knowledge that families with special needs children are more at risk of family breakups. Single parents are financially less able to afford private schooling (ruling that out as an option). Being a single parent or in the very least feeling like a single parent is exhausting and in order to be the best parent possible it is important we have time out to recharge and be ourselves. If I home schooled this would not be possible and burn out would be inevitable which would be no good for me and not productive for my children. (Ruling home schooling out as a viable option)
Maybe it is just Adelaide but to the best of my knowledge there are no options available to us. As far as I know and I have searched and received no advice from any departments / services, there are no schools out there that do cater for my children’s needs that we would have access to. Where are these schools with special units.
My children need a special environment that would respect their sensory integration, auditory processing and way of thinking including the literal understanding in order to feel safe, stress free and in the position to learn.
Every childs environment impacts on their learning outcomes. More so for children with individual needs. An environment that respects and deals with their needs is essential from as early as possible in order to avoid the behaviours we see all too often that develop as coping mechanisms that keep others at bay and avoid conforming in the learning environment. Flight or fight, get them before they get you, brick walls are up before you even start…. High levels of anxiety and panic that leads to defense and defiance and in turn behavioral traits that are unsocial and unacceptable in the mainstream school. I strongly believe if these children had had the supportive respectful environment that catered for their needs then they would grow up with confidence and tolerance of themselves and others with the desire to give back to the community ten fold instead of ending up expelled or leaving school early ending up in detention centers and on the dole with social and anger issues that continue to exclude them from living a happy fulfilling life .
I chose to put my career on hold in order to be there for my children. I feel I have been lucky enough to have had the opportunity to be with my children at their school as they progressed through the primary years, viewing their environment and being able to interpret their stress and suggest and implement structures that have avoided melt downs and avoided rising stress levels, giving them the opportunity to learn safely and happily.
My first thoughts of sending my kids to a special unit (if such a thing existed!) was one of fear that they would see themselves as having something wrong with them…which they don’t!….but then I realized they do not care about others being different, or on a different level of academia to themselves. As long as the competitiveness is removed from the equation it is not an issue.
As far as the issue with mixed ages within special units, it is my experience that the mixed age group is very appropriate for ASD children. ASD children’s social, academic and behavioural maturity develops at different rates and times from typical children, often seen as contradicting, with a wide range of everything in between being both immature in some areas and at the same time being extremely mature in others. ASD children generally are very egocentric – it does not come naturally that younger children do not have the same insight and maturity as they have and equally that older people have maturity and experiences they have not yet experienced. This deficit in understanding age related maturity means they are comfortable with mixed aged groups and in fact mixed ages gives them the opportunity to mix with others that may be several years older than themselves on an academic level and at the same time mix with others that may be years younger than themselves as their social level is immature. Having the mixed age groups allows them to grow and develop their maturity levels with like minded peers, allowing them to feel ‘normal’ and learn how to mature at the rate that relates to them and not at the socially expected age related increments that will all too often make ASD children feel inadequate.
Exposing ASD children to “normal social behavior” in main stream school is not necessarily a good thing. Some ASD children are very mature and exposing them to age related “normal social behavior” can be very traumatizing and debilitating for the individual. It can even ostracize the individual, emphasizing their differences, which in turn makes them vulnerable to depression.
I do not understand the comment made stating parents need to ask specialist as to what path to take in regards to schooling. First of all what paths are there???? Private schooling , home schooling or complete and utter hell in the public system – and there are no special units and schools that take ASD kids such as mine! Secondly in South Australia I was told that it would be unprofessional and unethical for a specialist to suggest what schools they felt would be suitable. In addition there are no specialist that have an overall view of schools that cater for the various and unique personalities of ASD children – and if that specialist did exist then the school that they suggested would very quickly become a special school with the bulk of special needs children for that area……Most schools do not encourage this path as a future for their school. Parents of ASD children generally know their child better than a specialist. Specialist can help by offering knowledge into behavours such as those that are based in sensory integration issues. But all ASD children are as unique as their age related unaffected peers. If there were true options available to parents then word of mouth would mean they would find then with or without specialist input.
So, I ask, in regards to school, what is a specialist going to be able to tell me that I do not already know???? None of my children’s specialists know just how intelligent my children are – largely because they do not talk to people they don’t see every day for at least 3 consecutive months, which gives a very false impression of their capabilities. I would love it if a specialist was able to point out the way forward in regards to my children’s schooling as I am yet to discover any suitable options for high school. In fact I have taken on two jobs in order to afford private schooling for high school and even then it feels like I am walking through a mine field on top of what the average parent of teenagers has to deal with. Whilst I know my kids are intelligent and have the potential to study whatever they desire, I can only live in hope that my kids will cope and survive high school with self esteem and confidence intact what grades they achieve is a bonus.
Louise
Hi Louise, sorry to hear you are having a hard time with the education system but I dare say you are not alone there.
Every child obviously has different needs, behaviors etc. so in stating that we have a choice of schooling systems I am saying that those three options are the only options that I am aware of that we have to choose from. It is then a matter of getting them placed in the system where we would prefer them to get an “education”. We may not be able to get the “choice” that we want however, or we may have to do more searching around, but we always have a choice either way.
When I refer to getting an opinion from a professional that knows your child I mean just that – an opinion, they don’t have to say which school, just which system they think they might cope with better, and you don’t have to agree with them, but in my experience it is always better to get as many opinions advise etc as possible, particularly from people who have experience in the subject, but it is then ultimately up to you to make the decision which you think best suits your child, no one knows your child better than you do, however sometimes we just need that second or third or fourth opinion / insight to make an informed decision.
There are a number of mainstream schools in Adelaide with special units, the Adelaide_Autism Yahoo group http://au.groups.yahoo.com/group/adelaide_autism/ has links to sites with that info, here is a DECS website with info on special units http://www.decs.sa.gov.au/speced/pages/specialneeds/intro/ and here is a link to a PDF document with a list of special unit schools in South Australia http://www.decs.sa.gov.au/speced/files/links/2009_Disability_Units.pdf
Hope this helps!
Unfortunately my 8 year old son with Aspergers is not eligible to be accepted into any of the special units, etc, as his IQ level is too high. He attends a mainstream public school at the moment and is struggling. Education choices for our ASD kids in Adelaide is absolutely appalling and is unacceptable. I am looking forward to hearing more about the apparent ASD units that are meant to be introduced here in the future. Not that I am sure we have a shot at getting my son a spot there, as there are so many of our kids out there that need this specialist educational setting.
Hi, I have a 5yr old Autistic child who is currently in pre primary in a main stream school. At the moment my little one is one of the youngest in her class (most of the other children are turning 6 this year) and not really coping nor is she learning alot of academic stuff. She is slowly getting the hang of the social side of things but still overall she is struggling. I am trying to get the headmaster at our school to allow her to repeat pre primary and am getting nowhere really! Was wondering if you had some links to any information (researched) that may assist me in my quest to have my child repeat. I have found a bit but the more info I have the better! Thanks.
Hi Natasha, we don’t have any relevant researched info on this just yet, however from personal experience you may be better off home tutoring your child. We have found that to advance the child on an academic level one on one home tutoring is the best way. It may not be the same for every child with ASD however. In our experience we have found that it is too difficult for a child with ASD too learn in a classroom environment, and most schools don’t have the resources to to focus on children with special needs, on an academic level they usually get left behind.
There are many programs you can do from home either by yourself or with other tutors. We will be covering in coming posts how we taught our daughter from home, the academics she misses out on at school, but we do not home school her as such.
Unfortunaltely when you have a child that is capable of learning yet can not cope with the “normal” systems in place you have to be pro-active and do all you can yourself, if we wait around expecting the system to change for us, our child will simply miss out!
Pingback: Autism ASD School for Adelaide | Isybee Autism
can anyone plz tell me where can i get the list of public schools (mainstream) that have special units for child with an ASD in ACT.i need that for my research ……………..thank u.
Like other parents,i am concern about my son with ASD. He is at WAS for second year, i noticed words that he can speak is from my help. I believed he learned about 10 words from school for 2 yrs and about 100 words are from home in 2yrs. Im thinking taking a risk to intergrate him into mainstream school, but I have read a few articles and my mind is stepping back. To be honest he learn alot from me, and I think at WAS it is base on playing and resting. I expect my son to learn in that enviroment not to play.
My son is 7yrs old, he is using Ipad very excellent, He can do spelling, matching in few secs, can read some words, a quick learner. Do you think I should take a risk?
Hi Nguyen.
We can only speak from our experience, we have relied on home tutoring for our daughters academic learning and have had her in a “Special School” because it is safer and generally kinder for her. They also have outings and activities within the school which are another source of learning for her.
However as mentioned above we don’t rely on the school for the academic side of things, they have a very broad range of learning capacity to cater for.
We believe that Isy would struggle in a mainstream school, but that is only our opinion!
Cheers.
I have a six year old son who has autism and an intellectual disability. He qualified for special school in victoria but we sent him to a small country school where we live. His sister also goes there and he has settled in wonderfully. He only gets 8 hours of integration aid time per week and this is mainly spent on literacy and numeracy. At this stage of prep, he can copy words himself using his own handwriting, but cannot write anything spontaneously and knows one sight word, his name and identifies numbers 1-5. He can count to five and record the number that matches what has been counted. I am interested to know if there are other parents with a child like mine
who may tell me if and when their child was able to read. We are so happy for our
little boy but have no idea what we should expect. We are very fortunate to have such a wonderful school and teachers. We are also fortunate that our son has no sensory
difficulties. He can concentrate fairly well also, although this only happened once our son started school. What are the special units people are talking about in the public school system? Have not heard of them.
Hi Kim
In Adelaide some of the public schools have special units specifically for children with special needs and or learning difficulties. This can be used as an alternative instead of a “Special School” I am not sure if the other states have similar set-ups, but it seems each state has different schemes.
Isy started off by only recognizing numbers, similar to what you describe, her handwriting at the moment is not great but she can spell, read and type very well considering. She understands very well and we use a diary for her day to day schedules. Her main hurdle at the moment is conversation and social interaction, however we have been noticing a marked improvement lately in these areas.
We found that teaching her the phonetic alphabet using interactive flash cards on the computer (how-to-make-interactive-flash-cards-with-sound) as well as table top work (ABA style) worked wonders for her reading and comprehension.
Above all we are of the opinion that the one thing that works the best is to make learning fun!
Cheers.
To Isy and family. Thanks heaps for your help. I have seen similar flashcards on iPad apps. Our local special school is using iPads 2 teach some literacy skills. We were able to get a free one and some of the apps we have not used yet but they look fantastic. How old is Isy now. We are going to get a small iPad group going at school so I am hoping Josh will use some of the flashcard apps there. Cheers, Kim.
Pingback: Autism mainstreaming | Calicastillo
Well Louise, you absolutely are not alone. I have a 16 year old daughter with Autism and an Intellectual Disability and we have found schooling an absolute nightmare. We will be glad when it is all finished, in about one and a half years. We have tried special class in mainstream, gosh I hate that terminology, like our kids are not part of it!!!! , special school, Modbury Special School actually which was fantastic on lots of levels and highly recommended but that only goes up to 15 years old then the students move on to a range of pathways and so now she is in a ‘special ed unit’ on a ‘mainstream’ school site and it has been nothing but a NIGHTMARE for three and a half years. There is NO inclusion with the dominant group other that the 1 program that I introduced into the school and the teachers are NOT special ed trained, nor do they know how to develop an NEP. We have argued at EVERY level of DECS/DECD, including the Minister’s for a proper NEP which is just being looked into now through a ‘happenstance’ should I say. This is three and a half completely wasted learning years and her self esteem down to her boots. I am just angry all the time. Sorry I can’t be of use other than to say that your children will be treated beautifully well AND taught well at Modbury but only till they are 15 and then they have to deal with the bullies. So much for the Human Rights Discourse. When my daughter finishes school at the end of 2013, I will retire from work and write a book on the way it is for us families and our kids and expose the whole thing,
Angry Janet